Plaque

Within this vault are deposited the mortal remains of John Thomas Barber Beaumont Esquire, F.A.S., F.G.S., the founder of this cemetery, who died on the 15th of May 1841, in the 67th year of his age.

He commenced his career in life as an artist, in which profession his ability combined with singular industry, economy and perseverance, raised him to a state of honourable independence but as he became affluent he did not become idle. His character always instinct with energy led him to prefer a life of useful activity to one of inglorious ease. During the alarm of foreign invasion in the last war he organised a corps, the Duke of Cumberland's Sharp Shooters, of which he became major commandant and in which his skill and courage were eminently conspicuous.

To improve the condition of the inglorious poor was ever his most anxious care. For this purpose he instituted the first savings bank "The Provident" where the industrious operative may securely deposit his savings and turn them to account. The County Fire Office and the Provident Life Office owed their origin and their success to his wise forethought, his judicious management and his incessant toil.

In the list of those patriots and philanthropists who have laboured to promote the intellectual and moral well-being of man no one will be found to have achieved a work better calculated to accomplish this high and sacred purpose than the Philosophical Institution in Beaumont Square. Who that contemplates this Institution with its immediate benefits and its more beneficial tendencies will not exclaim when he pauses pensive over the sepulchre of the departed founder.

May the fruits of this good work be coeternal with his reward and may his example be prolific of similar glorious deeds, till ignorance, superstition and depravity shall vanish from the land.